Context

The Assam Budget 2026 earmarked the greenfield airport at Doloo, on the outskirts of Silchar, as one of its headline infrastructure commitments. Silchar is the principal city of the Barak Valley in southern Assam and serves as an administrative, educational and commercial hub for the region. The existing airport at Silchar has long faced capacity and connectivity constraints, making a greenfield facility a long-standing demand of residents and businesses in the valley.

Alongside the Doloo project, the budget highlighted the expansion of Rupsi Airport in western Assam. Rupsi has remained largely non-operational for decades despite its strategic location near the borders of Bhutan and Bangladesh. The CMO's post described Rupsi as 'a key gateway for western Assam and neighbouring Bhutan and Bangladesh,' signalling an intent to activate the airport for both domestic and cross-border regional routes.

Policy Backdrop

Both projects sit within India's broader push to improve aviation infrastructure in the Northeast. The Centre's UDAN regional connectivity scheme, launched in 2016 and extended to Assam airports from 2017, has progressively sought to operationalise smaller airstrips across the region and reduce dependence on Guwahati's Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International Airport. Successive Assam budgets have aligned with this framework, prioritising secondary airports to open the state to wider domestic and international air traffic.

India has also articulated a broader connectivity agenda with its immediate neighbours. Airport upgrades in border states like Assam form part of a stated goal to deepen physical links with Bangladesh and Bhutan through road, rail and air corridors. Rupsi's revival, if realised, could complement existing land and river transit arrangements with both countries.

Stakeholders and Impact

The Doloo greenfield airport, if completed, would directly benefit Barak Valley's estimated population of over 35 lakh people across Cachar, Hailakandi and Karimganj districts, offering improved access to domestic air travel and reducing the region's isolation. Business communities in Silchar, which rely on air freight and passenger connectivity for commerce, stand to gain significantly.

For western Assam, the Rupsi expansion could ease travel for cross-border traders, students and workers who currently face long surface journeys to reach functional airports. It could also open possibilities for chartered or scheduled regional flights with Bhutan, which shares a border with the Kokrajhar-Bongaigaon belt, and Bangladesh, which maintains active trade and transit ties with Assam.

What's Next

The announcements mark a budget commitment, but the path to operationalisation involves several regulatory and logistical steps. Land acquisition, environmental clearances and competitive tendering for the Doloo project will be closely watched as indicators of implementation pace. For Rupsi, any joint working-group discussions with Bhutanese or Bangladeshi aviation authorities on cross-border flight permissions would be a significant milestone. The funding split between the state government and the Centre under schemes such as UDAN remains to be formally confirmed. Progress on both projects will be a key metric for the Assam government's infrastructure delivery record heading into the next electoral cycle.